October 15, 2004 -- Mel Kiper Jr. is off ESPN's draft board, NYP TV Sports has learned. After a 22-year run as ESPN's NFL draft expert, Kiper is being let go by the network.
"ESPN will not be renewing Mel Kiper's contract," Mark Shapiro, the network's executive vice president, confirmed.

"He would not agree to extend the standard non-monetary contract provisions of his current deal.''

ESPN would not elaborate.

Reached yesterday, Kiper, 44, was unaware of ESPN's final decision.

"You are telling me something ESPN hasn't told me," said Kiper, whose last contract expired Oct. 1. "There was some language that we were not agreeable to. As far as I was concerned, negotiations were ongoing.''

Kiper agreed that money was not an issue. He acknowledged that the language of the contract was the problem, but wouldn't go into great detail. Pressed for an example, he did say he wanted to know a specific number of SportsCenters he would be required to do.

Expect to see more of ex-Met GM Steve Phillips on ESPN next year.

"He worked the phones more than I think anyone else on our staff," said ESPN senior coordinating producer for baseball, Tim Scanlan.

Next year, Phillips is to be in studio and in three-man game booths. Larry Bowa, Barry Larkin and Todd Zeile also are on ESPN's radar for next season. Bowa, the fired Phillies manager, did one postseason Baseball Tonight.

While Larkin may play again, Zeile - who lives in California - probably would only want to do a limited amount of games and not commute to Bristol for Baseball Tonight.

Outspoken ex-Golden State coach Eric Musselman is finishing up negotiations that will make him the lead regular-season NBA game analyst on ESPN Radio.

If you win, everything is better - even your personality.

During Week 1, Fox' Terry Bradshaw called Tom Coughlin a "jerk." This past Sunday, before the Giants extended their winning streak to four, Bradshaw said, "I never should have called Coughlin a jerk."

Too little, too late. If Bradshaw wanted to demonstrate real remorse, he should have done it in Week 2, before the victories.

Sam Rosen and John Davidson are an enthusiastic duo when it comes to Ranger hockey, but it will be interesting to see if they can genuinely turn up the adrenaline when they open the AHL Hartford WolfPack season on MSG tomorrow.

Kiper -- example of success by sheer power of positive thinking. Not quality thinking, or intelligent thinking. Just postive, energetic thinking...

No way my friend, it was the hair. Kiper just like Don King has that kind of magical mind altering reality shaping heads of hair. Like time and space get warped by gravitational fields, money and fame are attracted and warped by Kiper's hair.

__________________re-sign: to sign againresign: to withdraw from employment